Letter #7: Start-Up

Good morning, Erin. 

YOU: Start Up is pretty chill.

EP 1: Physical abuse, dead parents, and deep emotional trauma.

ME: ...dude.

I joke (though...not really—that first episode was heartbreaking), but after the devastating ride that was Goblin, I was hoping for something a little bit on the lighter side, and this was definitely a nice change of pace from the heavier plots and themes of some of what I've watched before. In fact, I was so smitten with it that I often had to force myself away from it, even as I lay sick on the couch and, really, should have been taking time to sleep. 

...that said, I can't remember anyone's name, on this one. Well, I remember Nam Do-san. But everyone else is getting a nickname. So be ready for that. 

Now...let's have a little chat about Start Up, shall we?

1. Finally! A love triangle! (For the record, I was #TeamGoodBoy...and, believe me, we are going to get into that.)

2. I think the thing that struck me first was the soundtrack. I looooove the soundtrack to this show. Background music, songs—all of it. I've been looping the end theme, "Future" by Red Velvet, for days. And I can't stop humming it to myself, either. 

3. The second thing that struck me, though, is that this was like a subtle Hotel Del Luna reunion show: Manager Guy was the voice of their version of Siri (and showed up as a different character at the end), the spirit/god lady with the flowers was the Sandbox CEO, and one of the characters mentioned a song by IU which I'm counting as as much of a Lee Ji-eun cameo as they could afford. It was very exciting.

4. The third thing I noticed was that this seemed very much to be another take on Cyrano de Bergerac. Which is great, because it's a classic, and I love it. 

4A. …what I was unprepared for, of course, was that they were not going to go through with the whole Cyrano thing—but, again, we're gonna get into that. 

5. I'm a little ashamed to say that, in Ep 1, Little Sister (who grows up to be the main girl) is humming a song from Dance Dance Revolution...and I immediately recognized it without the dialogue between the girls confirming it. (I've never played DDR. But I do like terrible dance music.)

6. I've sort of tipped my hand that Good Boy (the guy who wrote the letters as a kid) was my favorite character, but can you guess who I thought #BestGirl was?

7. I alluded to Ep 1 being a rough one to get through (and, yes, it made me cry, 'cus I'm a big baby—and maybe you really do have a vendetta against me, who knows), but I want to take a moment to point out how much I appreciate that these shows are beautiful-sad rather than the edgy-sad or melodrama-sad that is so much more...prevalent, if not outright popular, these days. 

8. Yes, when Do-san shows up to the party all shiny and new to help Little Sister out, I had no idea who he was because he got a haircut. So…my streak continues.

9. In an Ep 2 flashback, Little Sister gave a critique of kissing in a movie she's seen, so...she's obviously the best.

10. ...except of course she isn't, #BestGirl is obviously Big Sister, the super-mean and bitter smarty pants. And you totally knew that's who I was going to pick. I can see you giving me a "can you believe this guy" eye roll. (I mean, she was given #23 at the hack-a-thon—which is my favorite number! It's like it was fate! Heck, she even gets her hair cut into one of my favorite styles (though not as favorite as after the time jump) when she quits working for her step-father! It was meant to be!)

11. I love that Good Boy had so little patience for...well, everything, really. But particularly that he was so put off by Do-san's absolute lack of romantic whimsy. It was such a telling detail that he was both proud of what he wrote in the letters and that they mattered to him. (Exactly what that last part meant will be covered later, I promise, but it's still a great detail.)

12. Do-san's friends (who I will call Goofy Friend #1 and Goody Friend #2) were very funny. I didn't think they would be, at first, but they grew on me.

12A. To wit: "Why would anyone give flowers to a girl? You can't even eat them!" (Might be the funniest line ever written. Or not--but it's still really funny.)

13. Y'know who else grew on me? The Mom. I reeeeeeally didn't like her, at first, because of how she treated the Dad and her kids (as kids and as adults), but I really came around on her when she got sillier and sillier, after she gets cut off from her new husband's money. I can't say I ever forgave her, exactly, but I softened on her enough to be happy when I saw her in a scene.

14. Do-san kept going on about RGB (that is, that the primary colors are red, green, and blue), and I kept thinking, "Aren't the primary colors red, blue, and yellow?" So I looked it up, and...there are competing schools of thought on this subject, seemingly driven by how the light spectrums are being utilized. Who knew? 

15. Daryl, to the TV, circa Ep 6: "This Alex Kwon fellow is a pip. I like him. He can stay."

16. Daryl, to the TV, circa Ep 11: "GASP—Alex Kwon! I trusted you!!!" 

16A. ...I knew the swegway was a sign he was bad news, but...he was just so handsome, dammit!

17. It was nice to see a group of white people who didn't speak English. That made me chuckle. (Only because I always find it funny that the assumption in primarily non-white countries is that all white people are, essentially, either British or American. I mean, it's not a bad guess that they'd speak English, since English is often the lingua franca, it just amuses me when it turns out not to be the case. And it was used specifically as a gag, here, so that made it doubly amusing.)

18. Still no Hyundais, though, so...

19. I'm disappointed that the "girl on the swing" story really did turn out to be about Little Sister and not Big Sister. Not just because Big Sister is my girl, of course, but because I think it would have been much more thematically and emotionally resonant for Big Sister—who abandoned the Dad and went totally corporate—to be the creative and empathetic legacy the Dad left behind. It just felt very easy and obvious and safe that it was Little Sister. Big Sister having that be something to eventually grow into being "worthy" of would have made for a much more interesting through-line, in my opinion. But, then again, this show had a bit of an issue with setups and payoffs—which we're going to get into—so, in the end, it's not surprising. But I still would have liked to see it.

20. Oh, before I forget: kissing gets a 9/10. That kiss between Little Sister and Do-san on the roof after he smashes the Step-Father's big glass name plate was...wowza. (Which is saying something, since—canonically—I think that was the first time either of those characters had ever kissed anyone.)

21. Really enjoyed the recurring gag of Good Boy falling off his treadmill.

22. I totally knew that Goofy Friend #2 was going to be the secret "I will have my revenge!" guy because he was literally the only main character without a subplot, to that point in the story. 

23. I felt awful for Do-san, as he continued to fall deeper in love with Little Sister. It was such an awful position to be in—but it was wonderful writing, that parallel between his relationship and the Math Olympiad, where inadvertently cheating brought him so much success, making him constantly struggle with this sense of both inadequacy and the belief that he didn't deserve what he was gaining as a result, despite the fact that, with the exception of that one inadvertent cheat (in both cases), he was very much succeeding of his own merit. 

23A. Still: screw that guy—#TeamGoodBoy4Life.

23B. I'm not just being flippant, here, either: there's a biiiiiig problem with Good Boy not winning—even though, ultimately, it should be fine that he didn't. But I'll get to that.

24. I could sense the time jump coming, you know. And I was seething every time the story inched that much closer to it. 

24A. Worse, though, is that not enough seemed to change in the three years that we were away from the action. Like, can you explain to me how Good Boy didn't make a move in three years? If I had my crush to myself—no third side to the triangle—for three years, you can bet I'd have asked her out before the three-year mark. Like, I get that she was still in love with Do-san, so you don't make a move right away, but...like, two years should be enough time to chip away at that heartache, right? What the heck was he doing, that whole time?!

24B. Unless...that was the point. Which—y'know what, never mind, we're gonna get to it. 

24C. I mean, I know the only reason for the three-year gap is so that the boys' contracts would be up and they could return to Korea, but...the changes we see for Little Sister and the Mom and Good Boy and everyone over there would have come about maybe a year later. I just didn't buy that things were what they were shown to be after three years. 

24D. ...except Big Sister's awesome new hairstyle. 

25. Ironically, perhaps, I quite enjoyed how the show would sometimes jump back to show us more context for or another angle on events we'd already seen. 

26. Another irony (within the show, not in my taste): when Do-san comes back and wins over Little Sister's heart, he's dressing an awful lot like Good Boy. I don't know if that was just meant as a sign of his professional (read as: monetary) success or if it was a symbolic turn that was supposed to represent that he'd either become or further integrated more of the boy from the letters than he was three years earlier. It just struck me as interesting, considering how pointedly he'd turned down all of Good Boy's affectations, earlier in the show. 

27. Oh—be very proud of me: I actually looked something up while watching the show, instead of just letting it go and then typing to you that I should look something up. So, I now know what Chuseok is. [waits for pat on the head]

28. By the way…I absolutely did not see that issue with the accidental phone swap (where Little Sister had Grandma’s phone) coming. At all. And…wow. What a dramatic way to reveal to Little Sister that Good Boy was the “real” Nam Do-san. I had my hands up over my mouth in shock and alarm when that happened. Like, I let out an audible gasp. 

28A. Too bad they didn’t…ugh, okay, I will get to it. (Promise—I’m getting there.)

29. So, Do-san’s mom is talking to him, at one point, trying to figure out how much Little Sister likes him, and she gives him this big speech about how if she wants to spend time with him on his birthday and gets all dolled up then it means she’s all in on her affections for him. Now, structurally, I knew this was setting up a misdirect, because of course it was. And we get to the point where his birthday comes, and she’s all dolled up, and she’s obviously going to break up with him so he can be free to run off to America for his new job…but it’s such a weird moment because Do-san doesn’t care about any of this AT ALL, at this point, so he doesn’t even notice any of it. So it’s really just a misdirect for the audience…which is not something we need, for that. It was just such an odd thing to set up and then not use within the story. But, again, this show has a weird relationship with set-ups and payoffs, so this is kind of par for the course. Which, I guess, is as good a time as any to springboard into my big, big, biiiig problem with the show; the ending (essentially).

30. …though, first, I’d like to mention my absolute favorite thing in the show: that the deepest, truest love story was that of Good Boy and Grandma. I thought their relationship was beautiful and beautifully written and an absolute joy to watch. Two strong, deeply complicated characters who are naturally drawn to each other and care more about the other than themselves. I was on board with them both immediately, and I never got off that train. (That bit where she tracks him down to give him new sneakers? Or how he reacts when he finds out she’s losing her eyesight? God, I’m tearing up just writing that down. Gorgeous. I love it.) And I want you to keep this in mind as I get into why I had such a problem with the ending.

31. So…I was absolutely furious about Little Sister and Do-san ending up together. I was literally booing at my TV. Which, yes, had to do with Good Boy being my favorite, but it was mostly because I thought the show did not deliver on its structural, narrative promises: it establishes a love triangle…and does nothing with it. Sure, there’s a little jockeying between the boys, but it never amounts to anything, in terms of Little Sister’s affections. She never grows romantically closer to Good Boy, even after he confesses to her…or after she finds out he was the boy behind the letters she’s been in love with for 15 years…or after she seemingly spends many, many, many days with him during the three year time jump. Which, as an isolated element of the story, is perfectly fine—but then why set up a rivalry if it’s not going to affect anything? No matter how much he steps in to help, no matter how many times she notices that he’s not just being a good friend, Little Sister never waivers in her love of Do-san. But Good Boy is clearly set up live he’s a love rival, so…why doesn’t anything happen, there? It was frustrating as all get out, to watch this version of Cyrano where the guy who’s secretly in love with the girl doesn’t even get consideration by the girl. Fine, he doesn’t win, but…how is it that he was never officially in the game? Isn’t the whole point that she’s in love with his letters? Wasn’t he affected by his love letter exchanges with Little Sister?

31A. More broadly (and I’ll bring it back around, in a minute), there are lots of things that are very clearly—and cleverly—set up early in the story that don’t get the payoffs they obviously should. Here’s two examples:

31A1. Immediately, I think of the fact that Samsan Tech’s main product, early on, is an A.I. program than can DETECT HANDWRITING…but it plays absolutely no part in Little Sister figuring out that Good Boy’s handwriting matches that of the letters she received from “Nam Do-san.” Sure, she gets suspicious ‘cus the writing looks so similar, but she doesn’t ever confirm it or even try to. And how perfect would it be that Do-san’s tech is the very thing that undermines his lie? Which I know sounds like a little thing, but it’s a point that’s never addressed. Heck, even if she ultimately chose not to use the tech, that tells us something about her feelings. Why have the handwriting be an issue if you’re not going to do something about it?

31A2. And then there’s all the Big Sister stuff. Clearly, her story is about needing to justify to herself that abandoning her sister—not the Dad, but the sister—was worth it. That’s why she’s so hurt that the Mom is (or at least seems) more concerned with Little Sister than with her. That’s why she tries to humiliate Little Sister by inviting her to the party. Heck, she’s already acquainted with Good Boy! And how does any of this influence Big Sister’s storyline? It pretty much doesn’t. Her character change, signified by rejoining her family, certainly happens, and it happens naturally enough (as she becomes more independent, she takes stock of what matters to her most—and it isn’t the business success she’s been working towards her whole adult life), but none of it is reliant on or connected to what was set up before it. She should be, in some sense, the fourth prong of the love triangle, vying for Little Sister’s affection, trying to take her for herself (not romantically, obviously). None of that is there. They start us off with all these connections and feelings—feelings that parallel those of almost all the other main characters—and…they don’t do anything with them. (See what I said before about her not being the girl on the swing.)

31B. The truly frustrating thing about the failure to pay off the romantic subplot with Good Boy is that they didn’t even need the love triangle to have him do the exact same things and feel the exact same way. Remember, I said that true love story of the show was between Good Boy and Grandma—and, in fact, the whole reason the plot starts is because Grandma asks him to find the real Do-san, which he only wants to do because HE DESPERATELY WANTS TO MAKE THE GRANDMA HAPPY. Everything he does is driven by his love for her—and, more specific than that, for his desire to bring back the affection and sense of family he had back when he was living with her and writing letters to Little Sister. Of course he’s going to fall in love (or think he’s fallen in love) with the pretty and charming girl he’s got such a strong connection to in the past. But that’s just as easily a complication or muddling up of his real feelings which—in parallel to what Big Sister is feeling—is for feeling wanted, feeling special, feeling loved, feeling a part of a family. It’s why he tells Little Sister that he wants her to think of him when she needs help. He wants her attention. Because he’s in love with her? Maybe. But definitely because he wants that connection they had when they wrote each other letters. He wants to feel wanted. He wants to make things turn out however they would be best for Grandma. He wants a lot of things that don’t necessarily have to do with romance. But the show goes out of its way to, structurally, make his motivation romantic, to make him a rival for the (apparently) main love story. It’s complex and moving and wonderfully messy. But it’s also pushed to the background in favor of the love triangle…which they then don’t do anything with. And that was so frustrating to see. 

31C. …especially since Good Boy is the best and he should have won. They don’t even hint that he and Big Sister might get together. Nothing. Ugh. I’m so mad. 

31D. Which is not to say that everyone has to end up with someone, in the end. Especially since Good Boy’s story resolves with him looking to take up a mentoring role for kids like him, which is about the most appropriate ending he could have. I just…you teased him as a romantic lead, show, and then you didn’t do anything with it. You know how seriously I take romance plots. 

But, um, y’know, bitterness over that aside, this was suuuuch a good time. Really, I couldn’t put it down, at times. Even, y’know, at maybe work times maybe. I dunno. Maybe. Who’s to say.

Anyway. Further proof that you have excellent taste. Which, again, surprises me not a wit, at this point. And, as always, I am excited to see what you’ll lead me to next. 

…even if, sadly, it doesn’t have Lee Ji-eun in it. 

--Daryl